


Revelation

by leici



Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-02
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-15 22:05:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2244990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leici/pseuds/leici
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Unrequited love didn't make him special or different from anyone else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Revelation

**Author's Note:**

> For the sslyricwheel "Apocalypse" challenge. I tried really hard to do something really and truly "End of the World" ish, but the story wasn't flowing at all, so I went the less literal route. It's really just Garrett's world, but I sorta like how it came out. I hope it fits the challenge okay.
> 
> The lyrics I got were from [Easy/Lucky/Free](http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/Easy-Lucky-Free-lyrics-Bright-Eyes/06BF0E38E56F4BC848256F5000043CFA) by Bright Eyes.
> 
> Written July 2008.

When Garrett was seven, he lost a pop fly in the sun and took the ball right in the face. Hours later, propped on the couch with his mother by his side, he'd asked timidly if he was dead. Of course, relieved to hear her son speaking again, she laughed. But the moment made an impression, and years later, Garrett still remembered that his mom had never answered him.  
  
In Zebulan, when Garrett was twenty-two, he misplayed a ground ball that hopped up and nailed him right in the orbital bone with enough force to knock him off his feet. He laid back on the grass, head spinning, staring up into the clear blue afternoon sky. Seconds later, the plane was broken by head and shoulders of the left fielder. In his dazed state, he had half a mind to ask him if he was an angel. Luckily, he kept his mouth shut.  
  
In October of 2008, while the Boston Red Sox were celebrating on their field, Garrett sat on the floor of the equipment room in the dark. His head was pounding, the steady feeling of it so reminiscent of taking that ground ball or that pop fly in the skull that it was hard to believe he'd just been standing there in the dugout when Seth struck out and their playoff dream ended.  
  
Borrowed time. It always felt like he was just one step away from succumbing to a fate he'd escaped all those years ago.  
  
He dreamt sometimes that his life was just an elaborate illusion, that he really had died all those years ago when that ball hit him in the head. Or that he was actually in a coma, still, and everything he thought he'd been doing was just a very vivid dream. There was no way he was really in the MLB, and playing in the World Series only cemented the sheer ridiculousness of it all.  
  
He was in an Earthquake once, over the summer when he was still living in Irvine. It happened in the middle of the night, and he woke up to the sound of a picture falling off the wall, the glass shattering. Coming out of a dream that way, it was understandable that he panicked. He honestly thought, if even only for ten seconds, that the world was ending.  
  
What shocked him was the disappointment he felt when he realized he was wrong.  
  
Unrequited love didn't make him special or different from anyone else. He certainly wasn't the first human who had ever fallen for the wrong person. From that first spring in North Carolina, in the lingering moments after taking a shot to the eye socket, he discovered that maybe love at first sight wasn't as unlikely as he'd always thought. Matt Holliday reached out and gave him a hand up that day, face-to-face for the first time, really, in the very beginnings of their training in single-A.  
  
They became best friends. Matt was easy to talk to, and he listened to Garrett, really paid attention. He remembered stupid throwaway details about things that most people wouldn't have heard in the first place. They played together and roomed together on the road, stayed up long nights talking about everything and nothing, and even though Garrett's frame of reference was pretty narrow, he knew what was going on. He never had a doubt that he was falling in love.  
  
But Matt was engaged, and Leslee was beautiful and sweet, and it proved impossible for Garrett not to like her. He was invited to their wedding, and he managed to convince himself that he was truly happy for the two of them.  
  
Mostly.  
  
Five or six, maybe seven flutes of champagne. He'd already made his toast, already had his piece of cake and his beef Wellington, was in attendance for their first dance and even obliged Matt's mother to a few turns around the ballroom floor. He was officially off the hook for the night. Out on the balcony, away from the rest of the guests, he stared out into the night sky, wiling any one of the stars hanging up there to come loose, to fall down to Earth and take the heartache away with a flash of light.  
  
Matt was ready to get married before he'd ever met Garrett. Even if something amazing happened to make Matt able to love another man  _that way_ , he certainly wouldn't leave Leslee for  _Garrett_ , with his too big front teeth and his squinty eyes, his weird body shape and disproportionate frame. He was an ugly, hopeless loser.  
  
The glass was so delicate that it shattered with the barest tap against the iron railing. The cracks weren't as ragged as he wanted, but still sharp, and he contemplated cutting the cord, severing the connection held him to this life, letting himself fall into whatever waited beneath the blackness and uncertainty of ceasing to exist. Give himself up, take himself out of the equation, end the fantasy before he realized that he wasn't going to get a happy ending.  
  
He tossed the busted flute down into the alley below, and went back to the party.  
  
Eyes closed, he rubbed hard at the center of his forehead, trying to ease the pain there. He imagined an aneurysm, a bulging blood vessel in his brain, so, so ready to burst. Like so many other times in his life, Garrett envisioned his own demise, bleeding into his head until his body gave up, pitching him sideways to the floor. Someone would find him later, after the Red Sox had moved their celebration on to some swanky hotel penthouse and the grounds crew started putting away balls and bats and gloves. Maybe they'd call the paramedics, or just the training staff, if any of them were still around, but it would be too late. A deformed brown stain the only thing left, the shell zipped into a bag, as dead as leaves.  
  
Maybe Matt would cry at the funeral. Or maybe he'd thank God for exacting such quick justice.  
  
Light flooded in when the door popped open, and Garrett only just lifted his head when he heard the scuffing of shoes in front of him.  
  
"I wondered where you ended up."  
  
Door shut and light snapping on, Garrett felt like his corpse, laid out on the autopsy table, Y incision cut into his chest. He knew they wanted at his heart.  
  
"Why didn't you tell me?"  
  
So fucking compassionate. Why couldn't he be angry? Or disgusted? Why did Matt Holliday have to be so fucking perfect?  
  
"Garrett."  
  
It felt like years had rolled by, but really it might have been thirty minutes. Everyone was miserable, almost no one said a word. And for some reason, in the middle of a whispered conversation down the hall on the way to the dugout, Garrett made the biggest mistake of his life.  
  
Just a kiss. One he'd been desperate for since he manned third base for the Mudcats. He managed to contain himself after the Wild Card victory, through the elation of the one and then two series sweeps, twenty-one wins out of twenty-two games. But here, in the wake of crushing defeat, he fucked everything up.  
  
"Garrett."  
  
He stared at the concrete between his cleats, grains of infield dirt scattered over the bare, cold, grey surface. He wanted it to open up and swallow him whole. He wanted the roof to come down and crush him, the universe to fold in on itself, the Earth to explode and take him and everyone else with it. He couldn't look up into those eyes. He couldn't withstand the expression of pity he knew would be on Matt's face.  
  
"It won't change anything. I swear it won't."  
  
He felt like his lungs would implode, like his ribs were curling in and smashing his organs. He couldn't risk a breath, for the fear of sobbing out loud. He bit down on his lower lip, his hands folded tight together in front of his shins, knees pulled up to his chest. He thought maybe, if he held his breath long enough, he could asphyxiate himself.  
  
Matt knelt, his strong fingers hooking Garrett's chin. Their eyes met, and Garrett exhaled stale air across the planes of Matt's face. Staring, he felt exactly like he did that moment on his mother's couch, head stuffed with cotton and body feeling heavy and numb.  _Am I dead?_  Matt's thumb skimmed his jaw line, fingers against Garrett's throat.  _Are you an angel?_  
  
"You should have told me."  
  
Matt's kiss answered.


End file.
